Washington state employers continued to cut jobs last month, but the state’s overall unemployment rate barely changed.

Tuesday, Washington pegged November’s unemployment rate at nine-point-two percent, roughly the same it’s been for the last three months.

State labor economist Dave Wallace says the unemployment rate is holding steady only because some jobless workers are dropping out of the labor force.

Dave Wallace: “Essentially what’s going on, as people fall out of the labor force, it’s either things such as retirement, people moving out of the state, or it could be people giving up looking for work because they felt they weren’t able to find it.”

Oregon’s unemployment rate was also essentially unchanged in November. The Oregon jobless figure, announced Monday, was 11.1 percent.